


Lame

by EmeraldBitch



Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: Alcohol, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Baker AU, F/F, Mutual Attraction, a gratuitous amount of nerding over bread-making, bartender catra, mentions of the pandemic, no beta we die like queen angella
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-30
Updated: 2021-01-09
Packaged: 2021-03-10 22:34:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28424802
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EmeraldBitch/pseuds/EmeraldBitch
Summary: Lame (/lɑːm, læm/)n. a double-sided blade that is used to slash the tops of bread loaves in artisan baking.Lame (/lām/)adj. how Adora feels like while staring at her crush from a distance.
Relationships: Adora/Catra (She-Ra)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 61





	1. Levain

**Author's Note:**

> im so sorry if you're one of my lapidot readers. im currently in catradora hell
> 
> not sure if i'll write more of this so if you want more info, i tweeted about this au at https://twitter.com/mrldbtch/status/1343816877236076544

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Levain
> 
> n. a leavening agent made from a mixture of flour and water used to bake bread. The flour and water mixture ferments and develops a healthy combination of bacteria and yeast cultures to help the bread dough rise while baking.
> 
> In which, good work ethics and timing work together to get a rise out of poor Adora.

_Bread flour? Check._

_Whole Wheat? Check._

_Rye flour? Check._

_Oats? Check._

_Corn flour? Check._

_Rice flour?_

Adora was about to check the next item on her mental list when a familiar form crossed her peripheral view. Outside the shop window and across the street was the leather jacket girl again, or as Adora and her team would call her... 

“Miss 3:30,” Adora mumbled, depositing the bag of rice flour on her work station.

It started with a joke, mainly at her expense, when Glimmer and Bow got sick of hearing about the elusive girl Adora keeps mentioning during their work hours. 

“Awwwww… Adora has a crush!” She remembered Bow squealing, hearts and sparkles might as well explode from his eyes from the tone of his voice.

“I-I do not!” Adora retorted.

“You do,” Glimmer replied, her face filled with exasperation, “You greet us every morning with ‘guess who passed by earlier?’. We know it’s Miss 3:30 and we know ‘she’s very punctual huh’”. She said the last part with air quotes, not unkindly. 

Adora blushed at the memory.

So, maybe she has a crush. And maybe it’s the girl currently crossing the empty streets. _“It’s not like it’s hurting anyone,”_ she thought while recounting the bags of flour on her station, missing another item when she sneaked a glance at the girl halfway across the street. _"Is she... looking at my direct—"_

The bag of bread flour flopped on her table. Thankfully still closed. It still covered a part of her station with a thin layer of flour though.

Adora sighed.

“Okay, it’s not hurting anyone… yet.”


	2. Mise en place

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mise en place (/mi zɑ̃ ˈplas/) 
> 
> a French culinary phrase that means "putting in place" or "everything in its place".
> 
> Life's not perfect but at least everything is in its place in Adora's life. Right?  
> Right?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the person most surprised to see this update is moi (derogatory)
> 
> \------------------------------------
> 
> Anyway, i included some terms that are used in the context of bread-making in this chapter. If you are not familiar with bread-making jargon, here's a glossary of the terms used in this chapter:
> 
> > Rise - The process of letting dough double in size. Usually in a warm environment.
> 
> > Proof - The final rise of the shaped loaves before baking
> 
> > Banneton - A woven basket, sometimes lined with linen, used to hold a shaped loaf while it is proofing.
> 
> > Sourdough Starter or levain - A leavening agent made from a mixture of flour and water used to bake bread. Au naturale version of those yeast granules in packets.
> 
> > Sourdough bread - Crusty bread made with sourdough starter or levain.
> 
> > Boule - "ball"-shaped dough
> 
> > Lame - A double-sided blade that is used to slash the tops of bread loaves in artisan baking.
> 
> > Oven Spring - The final burst of rising just after a loaf is put in the oven and before the crust hardens.
> 
> > Score - Slashing the surface of the dough to promote and control rising.

_“It’s her again,”_ Catra thought, watching with barely hidden amusement as the blondie in the corner bakery wiped her station with a cloth and a spray bottle.

Her nightly— daily?— commute to her apartment used to be uneventful sans the few instances of drunk college students dicking around in the area. And even those were more normal than weird ever since she started working as a bartender in one of the bars close to the campus. It’s not much. Apparently, she’s good at it since their boss, Hordak hasn’t fired her yet despite the manager, Weaver, hating on her guts for some reason. 

The bakery was a recent addition to the slowly recovering food street near the campus. After the pandemic, a lot of the stores had to close their doors to their customers. Some, permanently. Although not along the food street itself, Fright Zone, the bar she was working at, was on the brink of closing until Catra came in. Weaver would never admit that to her face of course but Hordak himself already gave her free reign to do anything to get his business on a better foot. She might as well become the new manager of the place but Weaver was still there to undermine her in front of others and claim her accomplishments.

Catra wouldn’t call herself punctual but she likes her routine. Anyone who stops her from going home at 3:00 in the morning will not have a nice day. It wasn’t like she doesn’t help with the clean-up. Catra had cleaned her fair share of puke puddles and shards of broken glasses. She’s just efficient with her time.

Speaking of punctual though, the blondie in the bakery was at it again, flexing her arm muscles around a bag of something-something. She would shake the hand of the person in charge of putting the bakery in front of the pedestrian crossing because watching the blonde girl move and lift big containers and heavy bags of flour across the street had been the highlight of her days for the past month.

She didn’t ogle of course but did sneak a few glances to enjoy the scheduled show. However, she might’ve snuck one too many glances when she saw a pair of bright blue eyes looking back at her just then. Catra cursed under her breath and tucked her hands in the pocket of her jacket. For the first time in a long time, she hastened her steps to go home. Definitely not hiding her flushed face in the dark.

* * *

Miss 3:30 was gone by the time Adora was done wiping the layer of flour on her station. Disappointed, she tore her eyes from the store window and took a deep breath, re-aligning herself to continue her work.

After one last sweep over her mental list of ingredients and baking materials to bring to her station, Adora walked to their walk-in refrigerator to get the racks of several bannetons of overnight-proofed sourdough doughs. Moving from muscle memory at this point, she tossed a generous layer of flour on one of the waiting flat trays. Quickly but gingerly, she deposited the doughs on the tray, enough room between them for the oven spring while letting the hot air to circulate between the boules. After giving the embossed swirls of the doughs a swift appreciative nod, she grabbed her lame from its usual spot on her station to rapidly scored the doughs with two great slashes. 

“X marks the spot,” she joked to herself, lifting the tray to their pre-heated oven.

Gently, as to not deflate the doughs she worked hard to develop, she slid the flat tray into the scorching hot oven, pouring hot water in the waiting tray inside it to promote steam circulation in the initial stages of the baking time.

She repeated the process seamlessly throughout the early morning. Her body almost on auto-pilot the entire time, moving effortlessly and efficiently. Everything was in its place. Every timer locked and ticking. Every surface covered with flour. But this time, it’s by design. 

Pink light crawling into their store window clued in Adora to the general passage of time. Any moment now, Glimmer and Bow would come in through the front door.

Adora hummed while scoring another batch of doughs. Watching with delight as the boules opened up in a predictable way. Nothing gives her more satisfaction than having a hand in shaping the trickiest doughs. It was one of the things she could get instant gratification from in the entire baking process. 

She used to suck at making sourdough bread. It was even a stretch to call her first boule a “bread”. It was more of a thick and pale pancake, really. The combination of weak levain and bad shaping techniques made for a very flat and very sour “bread”. She was rash and impatient. Her sourdough starter or levain was not ready. Her oven was ill-equipped. Her technique was lacking. 

But Adora ate that “bread” and continued developing her baking skills. She gave her starter the best flour her money could buy at the time. She “upgraded” her oven with several slabs of terra-cotta tiles too. She also took online classes, and eventually, face-to-face classes from a local baker. It was the silver-lining of the pandemic and all the available time she had at the time. It was the only thing that kept her sane, stuck in a far too small apartment. 

_“Time is the most important ingredient of the bread,”_ she remembered hearing from one of the baking channels on Youtube and she couldn’t agree more. Time got her this new skill set. Time got her into this job. Time got Adora her friends. 

She was dusting the last tray of the batch when she heard the familiar chimes of the bells attached to their front door. Without thinking, Adora grinned at her friends and greeted them. 

“Guess who passed by earlier?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> who wouldve thought i will write a fic based on my quarantine obsession lol  
> hope you like this chapter!


	3. Autolyse

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Autolyse (/ˈɔːtəˌlaɪz/)
> 
> n. the process of introducing water into the flour and setting the mixture aside to allow gluten strands to form without kneading the bread.
> 
> Catra meets Adora, but not before meeting Sparkles.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> now i want long island iced tea

This was not part of her routine.

Catra sighed as she adjusted the girl clinging to her shoulders. She should’ve known better than to serve her that Long Island. The girl, although dressed brightly in her sparkly jacket and a shock of pink hair, was clearly not used to the nightlife scene. She was quiet and awkward, stumbling on her words when Catra asked her for her order.

“Could you say that a little louder?” Catra half-screamed to the girl at one end of the bar over the booming speakers.

“Long Island,” the girl half-screamed back, pointing her finger at the said drink at the list of cocktails above Catra, “please.”

Catra raised her eyebrow at the choice, knowing that a customer ordering Long Island Iced Tea can mean two things in their area. First, they like it. Second, they didn’t know it has alcohol in it and assumed it’s just fancy iced tea. Trusting that the girl saw that the item was under “Alcoholic Drinks”, Catra asked, “Are you with your friends?”

The girl paused but ultimately nodded so Catra glided to her station, grabbing a clean towel along the way. Setting aside a highball glass full of iced water, she grabbed her jigger and measured the vodka, white rum, silver tequila, gin, triple sec, Coke syrup, and…

“Kyle! Where’s the lemon juice?!”

Clanging sounds could be heard from the door behind the bar if you listen hard enough. Then, a haggard Kyle busted out of the door carrying several squeeze bottles of lemon juice. “Sorry! I’m so sorry,” he squeaked as he replaced Catra’s empty lemon juice bottle with a filled one.

“I swear to god, Kyle,” Catra growled, but continued building the customer’s order. They were still trying out a new system of streamlining the cocktail-making process behind the bar by leaving the squeezing of the lemons off their bartenders. Therefore, saving a few seconds and trash space every time someone orders a drink with lemon juice in it. They were also doing that for the limes. 

_ “If this experiment fails, Weaver’s gonna have a field day,”  _ Catra thought, putting all of her angry energy into shaking the drink. With a flourish, she disposed of the iced water from the waiting highball glass and poured the shaken drink in it. Finally, she grabbed a straw and a wedge of lemon from an awaiting pile behind the bar and topped the ice-cold drink.

“One order of Long Island Iced Tea,” she called to the girl, handling her some tissue in the process. Catra was finishing her transaction with the girl when she saw her sipped from the straw and stared at the drink with sparkles in her eyes.

“Thanks!” She said, disappearing in the crowd, not before giving Catra a generous tip. Catra received it, thanking “Sparkles” in her head.

That was around two hours ago. Turns out, Sparkles wasn’t with her friends. And… she didn’t see or didn't care that Long Island was under “Alcoholic Drinks”. Catra felt more than heard the giggles beside her right ear, “You’re… so strong,” the drunk girl slurred, patting the hand over Catra’s neck on her left shoulder. “My friend... will like you,” she added, getting slacker by the second.

Catra bristled, gently shaking the girl in her arm, “Hey…,” another shake, the girl’s head lolled to the other side, waking her up, “Hey Sparkles! Don’t you conk out on me. Where’s this friend’s place you’re talking about?” Catra shook her again to get her to focus on her words. Sparkles looked at her through squinted eyes then pointed at the end of the road, across the street to—

“...The bakery,” Catra whispered. She almost fell when she felt the dead weight of the girl pull her down. “Sparkles?” No response. 

“I guess I’m dragging you there then.” She sighed.

* * *

Miss 3:30 didn’t pass by earlier...

...Nor thirty minutes after that. But Adora wasn’t like… waiting. She was just… checking the clock for her boules of bread in the oven. It’s not like you can be more than careful when timing your bread. What if one of the timers stopped? Or needed fresh batteries? You can never be too carefu—

_ BEEP. BEEP. BEEP. BEEP. BEEP. _

Adora sighed, tearing herself away from the store window looking over an empty street. “Just a quick check,” She muttered to herself, “You just need to release the steam from the oven and reset the timer. You can do this, Adora.” Try as she might but she could not take her mind away from the missing girl. 

“No, she’s not missing,” she told herself, replacing the timer on the oven door, “Maybe she was just earlier than usual or maybe I just missed her when she crossed the street.” she continued, stamping down all of the worst-case scenarios from her head. 

She was biting her thumb and pacing back and forth in front of the oven when a series of knocks rang through the quiet bakery. Already tensed, Adora moved quickly to the door and opened it cautiously. 

First, it was blue. Then, Adora saw amber. Both staring at her with wonder. “You…,” Adora whispered.

The girl cleared her throat, raising the limp hand that was hanging on her shoulder, “A-a little help?” she said.

Adora followed the hand with her eyes to the rest of the person hanging on the girl, “Glimmer?!” Adora cried, moving to extract her friend from the girl. “What happened to her?” she asked the stranger in a voice that she hoped wasn’t accusatory.

“I found her behind the place I’m working at… I didn’t know she’s alone when I served her at the bar,” she faltered, not looking at Adora, “I couldn’t leave her behind so I accompanied her to her ‘friend’s place’.” She looked at Adora again, “She guided me to this bakery before she passed out.” 

Adora checked on her friend. She looked dehydrated but fine overall. She will have a lot to ask her later but what’s important was her friend is safe. She straightened up, lifting Glimmer in her arms. Adora was glad she stuck to her lifting routine. Dead-weight Glimmer was heavier than usual. 

“Thank you so much for bringing her here,” she said to the girl. She hesitated before continuing, “Please wait here,” turning to gesture to the inside of the bakery, “...inside. I’ll just bring Glimmer upstairs.”

The girl nodded and entered the store’s premises, locking the front door on her way in. Adora thanked her for that too and proceeded to carry her friend up the stairs behind the counter. 

* * *

Catra sat on one of the many empty chairs of the bakery, processing what just happened. Specifically, the way the blonde girl lifted Sparkles. Catra hid her face in her hands, hoping against hope that the blood under her cheeks would calm down by the time the blonde girl returned. 

Catra groaned in her palms. She couldn’t deny it anymore. 

She had it. Bad.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i was that person who didn't know that long island's alcoholic hahahaha  
> still yummy tho. and researching this fic made me want to try making some for myself since i can't exactly go outside right now 
> 
> stay safe and drink responsibly!

**Author's Note:**

> not sure if im gonna continue this coz this is just me as a person but yeah  
> hope you like this ficlet


End file.
